I have been following the AIS stuff pretty heavily and will be plunging for the purchase of a AIS B transponder now that they are FCC approved. I actually find that for normal cruising in the Puget Sound that AIS works incredibly well in lieu of having a Radar up and running. Combine Radar and AIS you got a kick butt target tracking system.

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Cool Jody. I have an "air card" for my work laptop. With that website, I can get AIS info through the internet on the work boat!

Even better - looks like around your neck of the woods they really get the info for it - great blend of technology actually. Will be decent to see how it goes for the AIS-B systems - it could be the poor mans Spot tracker of sorts...

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Good Northwest coverage; I haven't checked out other regions. Even works with the iPhone. Refresh rate is only every 5 minuites, but you can see that the 16 knot, 935' container ship two hours ahead of time.

I believe AIS is on par with GPS as a useful technology. With RADAR and a chart, you could find your way in a nighttime fog, but with RADAR, GPS and AIS, you can find others, and naturally, you still have the paper chart for when the GPS goes wonky.*

Of course, AIS and GPS are frequently interlinked, so AIS data does not, in fact, replace deck watches, and if the AIS shows the only ship in 10 miles bearing away and the RADAR calls for a collision, believe the RADAR.

I personally think that the greatest value of AIS is to identify local traffic and to tell big ships where you are relative to their track. I have had conversations with lake freighters even in little Lake Ontario where they have not seen me on RADAR even when provided with a reciprocal bearing, although a good pair of binoculars usually reveals me or my lights.

To be fair, my steel boat apparently is visible to RADAR on either shore .

Anyway, my schoolmarmish tone is just to reinforce that AIS is cool, but not, as I have read in certain spots, a "replacement" for anything. It gives supplemental information to the usual careful watch that should be kept in any case.

*Anyone who thinks "it won't" or "it can't" hasn't watched the GPS co-ordinates wildly correct without warning, hasn't seen "tests" by the military alter the accuracy, again without warning, hasn't found their plot mysteriously cutting through a peninsula, or is someone who thinks the current solar surface "quiet period" will last, like the bull market, forever.

Good Northwest coverage; I haven't checked out other regions. Even works with the iPhone. Refresh rate is only every 5 minuites, but you can see that the 16 knot, 935' container ship two hours ahead of time.

I'm sitting on my boat right now, just off Galveston Bay linking my laptop through my cell phone and I just saw the AIS for the Houston Ship channel... Great stuff

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